One of the sources of delay in the transmission of a packet through a multi-node communications network is the need to switch the packet at various nodes of the network. Such delays increase the need for additional bandwidth and buffer space.
Many intra-node pacing techniques have been developed to reduce intra-node switching delays. One such method is described in the following reference: Andrew S. Tannenbaum, COMPUTER NETWORKS, 2nd ed., Prentice Hall, 1988, Sec. 2.7.1.
All of the pacing techniques known in the art, however, are inefficient because of the overhead involved in transmitting from an input line adaptor module to a output line adaptor module of a switching node. This inefficiency occurs because all of the pacing schemes in the art will send a polling signal to an incoming line adaptor module from an outgoing line adaptor module without knowing whether or not the incoming line adaptor module has packets to transmit to the outgoing line adaptor module. Therefore, a need exists for a more efficient intra-node pacing scheme to reduce delays and overhead in the transmission of packets through multi-node networks.